Holly Koons McCullough has been named the new executive director of the Arlington Arts Center (AAC). She brings more than 20 years of curatorial and administrative experience in the visual arts to AAC.
Since 2014, McCullough has steered the Greater Reston Arts Center (GRACE) as executive director and curator. For two years prior to that, she served as that organization’s curator. Under her leadership GRACE has seen exhibitions by nationally-recognized artists including Renée Stout, Joyce J. Scott, Patrick Dougherty, and Shih Chieh Huang. In this role she also secured major corporate sponsors like Volkswagen for GRACE’s annual Northern Virginia Fine Arts Festival.
Previous to her appointment at GRACE, McCullough was the director of collections and exhibitions at the Telfair Museum of Art in Savannah, Ga. She spent 15 years at Telfair where she spearheaded projects like Telfair’s first internationally-traveling exhibition, Dutch Utopia.
McCullough holds a B.A. from the University of Georgia in English and art history, and an M.A. in art history from the University of Notre Dame.
Since August of 2015, Karyn Miller, AAC’s director of exhibitions, has served as acting executive director. Upon McCullough’s arrival later this month Miller will return to leading the curatorial vision and development of AAC’s exhibitions program.
In the 10-month transition period, Miller, in concert with AAC staffers Samantha Marques-Mordkofsky and Carollei McMillin, and the board of directors, have maintained a full schedule of activities and programs including a dedicated artist-in-residence program, classes for children and adults, contemporary art exhibitions and public events. They also launched a year-end giving campaign that exceeded its goal by 50 percent, and surpassed goals for foundation and government grants by 10 percent.
McCullough will join AAC on May 31, at the tail end of the Spring SOLOS exhibition, and kick off her tenure with the opening of Strange Landscapes, AAC’s main summer exhibition, along with the beginning of AAC’s nine-week summer art camps. There will be an opening reception and open studios on Saturday, June 25 from 6-9 p.m.
Gallery hours are Wednesday - Sunday, 12 - 5 p.m., or by appointment
Visit www.arlingtonartscenter.org.